circunstancia

Forms

circunstancia f (plural circunstancias)^[1] Medieval texts write çircunstançia, and in 1348 also çircumstançia.^[2] In Argentina it was often pronounced circustancia.^[3]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin circumstantia (“a standing round, surroundings”),^[4][1][5] a word that Autoridades called purely Latin.^[6] The Latin noun comes from circumstāns (“standing around”), the present participle of circumstō (“to stand around”), from circum (“around”) and stō (“to stand”).^[7][8][9] Corominas explains it as the neuter plural “things around”,^[5] and Bénaben notes that this plural was felt as a feminine singular.^[8] Seneca used the Latin word to translate Ancient Greek ἀντιπερίστασις (antiperístasis),^[9][10] and in Medieval Latin it meant both “context” and “circumstance”.^[11] De Vaan traces the Latin verb of standing to a present Proto-Indo-European *sth₂-eh₁-ie/o- (“to stand”).^[12]

The same Latin word is French circonstance, Italian circostanza, Portuguese circunstância, Catalan circumstància and Romanian circumstanță.^[1][13][14] Cunha takes the Portuguese word from French.^[15]

Earliest recorded meaning

Corominas dates the word to the Siete Partidas (c. 1260).^[5] The passage that Autoridades quotes from the first Partida tells confessors first to hear the sin and then to inquire into the things around it, à que dicen en Latin circunstancias, “which in Latin are called circumstances”.^[6] A catechism of 1325 (in a copy of 1472) lists them: the place where the sin was committed, the person and the time.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The word began in the language of confession and law: the Ordenamiento de Alcalá (1348) speaks of presumpçiones & çircunstançias that help a judge find the truth.^[2] Autoridades (1729) defines it as the accident that accompanies a person or an act, and also as a quality or requirement.^[6] The Academy's 1817 edition adds en las circunstancias presentes “as things stand”,^[16] and Salvá (1846) persona de circunstancias, a person respected for his authority or rank.^[17] Today the DLE also gives the sense of all that surrounds a person, the world as someone's world.^[4] Law distinguishes circunstancias agravantes, atenuantes and eximentes.^[4][18]

Timeline

• c. 1260 – the Siete Partidas, the first record.^[5][19]
• before 1284 – Alfonso X's General Estoria, in a 15th-century copy.^[2]
• 1348 – the Ordenamiento de Alcalá, the first record in a manuscript of its own time.^[2]
• 1492 – Nebrija's Latin–Spanish dictionary translates Latin circumstantia.^[20]
• 1560 – the first record from the Americas, in Yucatán.^[21]
• 1729 – Autoridades defines the word as “purely Latin”.^[6]
• 1817 – the Academy adds en las circunstancias presentes.^[16]
• 1846 – Salvá records persona de circunstancias.^[17]
• 1884 – the Academy's dictionary gives the Latin etymology.^[22]

Meanings

Noun

1. A circumstance: an accident of time, place, manner and so on attached to the substance of a fact or saying: Nadie sabe en qué circunstancias se perdió.^[4][1]
2. A quality or requirement.^[4]
3. (usually in the plural) The situation in which someone finds himself: En estas circunstancias no podemos esperar.^[18][4]
4. All that surrounds a person; the world as that person's world.^[4]

Word family

• circunstancial
• circunstanciado

Related words

• circunstante
• estar
• Latin circumstantia
• French circonstance

Usage notes

Circunstancia agravante and circunstancia atenuante are the legal terms for aggravating and mitigating circumstances.^[4] De circunstancias means “occasional”, or of a face or voice put on to suit a sad occasion.^[18] In Chile and Bolivia en circunstancias de que means “although”.^[23]

References

1. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Real Academia Española (2013–), Corpus del Diccionario histórico de la lengua española (CDH), version 3.1, https://apps.rae.es/CNDHE, p. s.v. circunstancia
3. ^ Santamaría, Francisco J. (1942), Diccionario general de americanismos, 3 vols., México: Pedro Robredo
4. ^ a b c d e f g h Real Academia Española; Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2014–), Diccionario de la lengua española, 23rd ed., online version 23.8, https://dle.rae.es, p. s.v. circunstancia
5. ^ a b c d Corominas, Joan; Pascual, José A. (1980–1991), Diccionario crítico etimológico castellano e hispánico, 6 vols., Madrid: Gredos, p. 2, 776
6. ^ a b c d Real Academia Española (1726–1739), Diccionario de la lengua castellana (Diccionario de Autoridades), 6 vols., Madrid: Francisco del Hierro, p. 2, 359
7. ^ Gómez de Silva, Guido (1988), Breve diccionario etimológico de la lengua española, México: Fondo de Cultura Económica / El Colegio de México
8. ^ a b Bénaben, Michel (2000), Dictionnaire étymologique de l'espagnol, Paris: Ellipses
9. ^ a b Glare, P. G. W., ed. (2012), Oxford Latin Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Lewis, Charlton T.; Short, Charles (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ Niermeyer, J. F. (1976), Mediae Latinitatis Lexicon Minus, Leiden: Brill
12. ^ de Vaan, Michiel (2008), Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 7, Leiden; Boston: Brill
13. ^ Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert
14. ^ Alcover, Antoni M.; Moll, Francesc de B. (1930–1962), Diccionari català-valencià-balear, 10 vols., Palma de Mallorca: Moll, p. s.v. circumstància
15. ^ Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon
16. ^ a b Real Academia Española (1817), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 5th ed., Madrid: Imprenta Real
17. ^ a b Salvá, Vicente (1846), Nuevo diccionario de la lengua castellana, París: Librería de Don Vicente Salvá
18. ^ a b c Moliner, María (2007), Diccionario de uso del español, 3rd ed., Madrid: Gredos, p. s.v. circunstancia
19. ^ Diccionario del Español Medieval electrónico (DEMel), data publication 2026 (CC BY-SA), Universität Rostock, p. s.v. circunstancia
20. ^ Lleal, Coloma (dir.), DICCA-XV: Diccionario del castellano del siglo XV en la Corona de Aragón, Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, Grup d'Estudis d'Història de la Llengua (GHCL), https://ghcl.ub.edu/diccaxv
21. ^ Boyd-Bowman, Peter (2003), Léxico hispanoamericano 1493–1993, ed. Ray Harris-Northall and John J. Nitti, New York: Hispanic Seminary of Medieval Studies, p. s.v. circunstancia
22. ^ Real Academia Española (1884), Diccionario de la lengua castellana, 12th ed., Madrid: Imprenta de D. Gregorio Hernando (the first Academy edition with etymologies), p. 245
23. ^ Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (2010), Diccionario de americanismos, Lima: Santillana; online at https://www.asale.org/damer, p. s.v. circunstancia